By Ketki Saxena
Investing.com -- In a significant move, Twitter, the globally recognized social media platform, has undergone a rebranding exercise and is now known as 'X'. The change was initiated on Monday, July 24, 2023. The company's iconic blue bird logo has been replaced with a stylized symbol, which was projected onto its San Francisco headquarters. This transformation underscores the ambitions of Elon Musk, who acquired the social network last year for $44 billion.
The rebranding signifies Musk's aspiration to incorporate Twitter into his broader vision of an "everything app." However, it also presents a risky gamble to reinvent a business that has been struggling since he purchased it. The new brand identity was unveiled with a tweet from Linda Yaccarino, the company’s CEO, saying “Lights. Camera. X!”
The rebranding is more than just a cosmetic change. As Twitter has grappled under Musk's leadership — with a 50% drop in ad revenue, negative cash flow, and competition from Meta’s Threads — he has increasingly stressed the company's importance in what he now calls X. The billionaire envisions creating a super-app that could serve as a platform for everything users could do online, similar to WeChat in China.
However, as third-party data suggests user numbers are falling, there are questions about how much time Musk has to make the reborn 'X' successful. The reaction of advertisers to the rebrand will be crucial for the platform's future, given that its advertising revenue has tanked significantly, and it hasn't recovered as quickly as hoped, remaining cash-flow negative as of the second quarter.
It's worth noting that Musk has long been fascinated by the 'X' identity. His second start-up was known as X.com before it evolved into PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL). He also incorporated 'X' into the name of SpaceX and Tesla’s first car model and recently named his new artificial intelligence start-up xAI. Not to mention that one of his kids is infamously named X Æ A-Xii. - apparently pronounced X-Ash-A-12 (as per Elon Musk) or Ex-ay-eye (as per the baby's mother, Canadian singer Grimes).